Why I Love Half Nelson

I really, really wanted to see the movie Australia tonight, and write a review of it here afterward.  Unfortunately, due to forces beyond my control, I did not get to see it (would you believe the last showing of the night was at 8:15pm???  That must be one loooooong movie).  Instead, I find myself sitting at home drinking a glass of wine and watching Half Nelson, a film that, in my opinion, has got to be the most underrated movie ever.  Seriously, no one ever talks about it, but it is quite possibly my third favourite movie ever (after The Godfather, Almost Famous, and maybe when I'm in certain moods The Wizard of Oz and/or The Squid and the Whale - another really underrated movie).

When I first saw Half Nelson I really didn't know what to make of it.  I knew that I liked it, but it's such an odd premise - a teacher who's addicted to crack?  The movie doesn't really have a plot per say...it just sort if...is.  Dan Dunne, Ryan Gosling's character, is a drug addict middle school history teacher in a very low-income neighbourhood.  All his students are poor and Black and/or Latino, yet are in much better shape than he.  The movie is about Mr Dunne's friendship with Dre, a thirteen year old student to whom he attempts to be a mentor of sorts.  Yet Dre is also friendly with the neighbourhood drug dealer, who does not offer her drugs but a job delivering them to his clients (including Mr Dunne).  As a white male teacher from a middle class background, Mr Dunne is superficially "the man", representative of the authoritative forces that oppress minorities.  Yet ironically it is he who suffers from what poverty breeds.

It sounds a little cheesy, I know, but you really should watch it.  Ryan Gosling is truly an amazing actor - maybe even the best of our generation.  And I L-O-V-E the Broken Social Scene soundtrack.  You Forget it In People is one of my favourite albums of all time.  Every time I watch Half Nelson I like it more.  It's so subtle and elusive.  In novels, these qualities can sometimes get on my nerves, but never in well done movies.  Sometimes the general feeling a film produces is worth so much more than an engaging plot. 

Review: Prep

I read the novel Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld in about three days.  Back in the good ol' days when I was a student that would have been nothing, but anymore I'm so short on time I'm lucky to have an hour a day to read (which usually occurs between 11 and 12 o'clock at night while simultaneously tuning into The Daily Show and Colbert Report).  From the many unread books on my shelf, I chose Prep because I wanted more of the can't-put-it-down-ness of American Wife, and am happy to say I was not at all disappointed.

Prep is about the high school years of one Lee Fiora, who leaves her family in Indiana at age fourteen to attend boarding school in Massachusetts.  Lee, now in her mid-twenties, tells her story in a first person narrative.  Because of the time that has elapsed between the story's present and the era it tells of, she is able to observe her high school years semi-objectively, without forgetting what it felt like to be in the throes of the (seemingly) heart-wrenching debacles of the teenage years.  As a result, I found myself reliving many of my own awkward, hormone-raging, cat-fighty, pseudo-disastrous high school experiences.  Remember what it was like to have girl crushes, glow with pride at being the teacher's pet, and be used by teenage boys?  In many ways, youth is not entirely unlike adulthood, but of course we all pretend it is so we can feel good about the fact that we've matured.  Prep, however, is far from being a teen soap opera.  Sittenfeld has a gift for expressing certain ideas and feelings with uncanny accuracy.  Take, for instance, this passage, in which Lee describes her routine at the airport while waiting for her flight home:

"What I usually did was get an ice cream and eat it standing in front of a magazine rack, reading, and then, just before my plane boarded, I'd buy one magazine - an especially fat issue, which I'd purposely not have read in the store.  There's be other Ault kids in the terminal, of course, an if we passed, we acknowledge one another, usually without speaking, but I didn't hang out with them.  As a freshman, I'd been too intimidated....a bunch of students always sat in the back of the restaurant...smoking and talking noisily....and now that I was older, I was still intimidated...but I also wasn't particularly interested; I liked eating ice cream and reading magazines by myself.

But I had gotten no farther than the entrance to the ice cream shop when I felt a tap on my shoulder.  I turned.

"When's your flight?"  It was Horton Kinnelly.  "You should come back with us"....

"That's okay", I said before remembering myself - Horton looked at me, but we both pretended I hadn't tried to decline the invitation - and adding, "okay sure"."

What follows is a description of the scene in the restaurant, which Lee finds somewhat awkward, but clearly only as a result of her self-conscious nature.  I can TOTALLY relate to this situation.  Even as an adult, that kind of thing happens to me all the time.  In another passage, which I seem to be having difficulty locating for a quote, Lee talks about how once she has had a positive encounter what a person, it's best to make sure maximum amount of time possible passes before she has to see that person again.  That way the good relationship can be preserved for as long as possible, as she will not be able to say something stupid and eff it up.  I know EXACTLY how this feels but have never consciously acknowledged it before, even to myself.  Like Alice Munro, Curtis Sittenfeld often seems to know readers better than they know themselves (that is if my experiences reading their books are at all common).

The other important aspect of Prep is the fact that Lee is a scholarship student at a prestigious boarding school, meaning she is one of the few middle class students amongst the children of the very wealthy.  Because of her background, Lee often feels shoved to the periphery of the student body, a feeling that the adult Lee implies was largely unfounded in her narration.  The theme of self-inflicted and/or imaginary exclusion is thus central to the story, which comes together extremely well.

Review: Starbucks Holiday Goodies

Lately I've been in need of some serious cheering up, and for the longest time nothing seemed to be working.  Not comforting words from people I love, not yoga or other forms of exercise, not drinking an entire bottle of wine while watching screwball comedies, not terrifically addictive novels or aesthetically profound short stories, not taking Stella for long walks while listening to great music on my iPod.

Then I walked into Starbucks.  Yes I know, I'm a superficial slave to consumer culture, but no business can so successfully rush the Christmas season like Starbucks.  It's true that I don't particularly like Christmas.  I've found in recent years Christmas day itself is anti-climatic beyond words.  I keep expecting it to be this wonderful, magical occasion.  I imagine it as it was when I was a kid, and would wake up at four in the morning intoxicated with excitement and anticipation about whether Santa had been there yet.  (I was never one of those kids who would make my parents get up at five am...I always waited until at least seven, perhaps unconsciously developing my preference for the moment before any big event to the event itself).  Back in the good old days, a thin layer of snow always lay on the ground for the holiday season, and everything tasted like chocolaty mint and smelled like clementines and blue spruce.  In the past, December nights were never pitch black, but a welcoming navy blue glow, and my favourite Christmas movies were always on TV whenever I switched it on.  Christmases of the past were times when everyone in my extended family liked me (and one another).  For some reason, I remember big family dinners as these joyous occasions full of laughter and free of awkwardness.  Now...not.

Thus I find that the magic of the Christmas season seems to wear off when it gets very close to the actual day.  The time I like best is just before just before...late November and early December, when I can still believe that the upcoming Christmas season will turn the world into the idealized dreamland I remember.  No place captures this feeling like Starbucks.  Last year I discovered these delightful holiday sandwiches, which consist of turkey, cranberries, and stuffing nestled between two slices of heavily buttered whole grain bread.  I had my first of the season yesterday and found it to be just as tasty as I remembered.  The quality of these sandwiches seems to be slightly superior to that of their regular sandwiches, which more often than not feature slightly stale and/or soggy bread (yes, I'm a picky bread person).  Not to mention the fact that putting stuffing in a sandwich could be conceived of as daring and experimental...bread inside bread...come on!!  But the fact that the idea actually works is proof of its brilliance.

So positive was my experience with the sandwich that I returned to Starbucks today to try their Peppermint Twist Mocha - at least I think that's what it's called.  Personally I'm not really sure how this is different from the regular peppermint mocha, so forgive me if I don't remember the correct name of the beverage (in fact, the difference was enthusiastically explained to me by my ever helpful barrista, but I can't seem to recall what it was...something to do with the whip cream, I think).  Anyway, it doesn't really matter because it tasted wonderful and Christmas-y, as did the Gingersnap latte enjoyed by my husband (again I'm not really sure how this differs from the Gingerbread latte of last year).  Anyway, I do recommend you make a trip to Starbucks before it gets too close to the real Christmas season.

Review: Gods Behaving Badly

Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips is an bizarrely effective story in which the ancient Greek Gods of Olympus reside in modern day London.  As no one believes in them anymore, they have lost much of their power.  However, the gods continue to control the workings of the world from causing the sun to go up and down (Apollo) to making people fall in love (Eros) to keeping them from having endless sex in all imaginable places (Artemis).  Phillips undoubtedly has a flare for the creative.  Some highlights:  Aphrodite's job is to perform phone sex, Apollo is featured on a cheesy psychic TV show, and Eros is a devout Christian.  

The problem with this book is that it would be impossible to understand without a knowledge of Greek mythology.  I had to stretch my memory (with the help of Wikipedia) all the way back to Mrs. Bell's grade six class in order to get most of the references.  What can I say?  I liked this book, but I'm not really sure why (otherwise this post would probably be longer...).  It went really fast.  The story is good, but I'll probably forget it before too long.  It's the concept itself that drives the book.

Happy Election Day

Is it wrong that I care significantly more about the American election than I did about my own country's several weeks ago?  Possibly, but I think most people can understand.  In honour of the election, I'd like to share with you a Frank Rich piece from the New York Times.  It reminded me of how much I enjoy the movie Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, and how badly I want Obama to win.  Not that I needed to be reminded of the latter.  Please God let him win. 

Review: American Wife

The novel American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld tells the life story of Alice Blackwell, a fictional character whose life closely resembles that of first lady Laura Bush.  Ever since I heard that Laura was a teacher and a librarian (not to mention a democrat) prior to marrying W, I've been intrigued and eager to learn more about her.  Lacking the patience for traditional biographies, I was thrilled when this book came out because it provides real-ish information disguised as a fictional story.  Sittenfeld is an excellent writer and story-teller, and American Wife is one of the most addictive non-chicklit books I've read in a long time - so much so that all I could think about as I went about my daily routine was how I would much rather be at home reading than at work, yoga, walking the dog, etc.  

The novel is divided into four sections, titled for the addresses Alice lives at in the corresponding eras of her life.  Incidentally, I think the first two parts were my favourites. They depict Alice's life as a youth and young woman (before the Charlie, the W character, comes into the picture).  Alice is an intensely likable character, and easy for bookish girls like me to relate to.  She and Charlie are well suited for each other in the sense that they are complementary, but as the book goes on it becomes clear that the reader is intended to see Alice as the better half of the marriage.  For much of the second half, the novel maintains a "what was she thinking" sort of tone, and the last section (1600 Pennsylvania Avenue) reads like one long apology on the behalf of Laura for the mistakes of the Bush administration - oops, I mean Alice on behalf of the Blackwell administration.  Despite being a little too preachy in this respect, this stance is necessary in a way in order for the novel to tie up certain loose ends from earlier in the story.

Like Oliver Stone in his new movie W, Sittenfeld seems grudgingly forced to portray the president as a misguided but ultimately good hearted fool, who tragically gets into politics for all the wrong reasons and is subsequently blinded to reality by his own pampered life and happy-go-lucky attitude.  There's so much personal hate out there for Bush that it's sometimes good to be reminded he is for the most part a figurehead (the real villains are people like Karl Rove and Dick Cheney).

Mostly, I have to wonder what the real Laura Bush thinks of this book.  It's hard to believe she hasn't read it, given what a reader she is.  Overall, I think she would quite like it.